


Memories and Secrets

by Ms31x129



Series: X-Files: Altered Truth [3]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, F/M, MSR
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-08-24 02:29:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16631159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ms31x129/pseuds/Ms31x129
Summary: Mulder and Scully are back on the X-Files after the events at El Rico, but Diana still looms and Mulder is experiencing headaches...





	Memories and Secrets

Day 10  
Mulder's apartment

It's the 10th day since the X-Files are back in the hands of Mulder and Scully. Unfortunately their partnership hasn't healed completely. Will it ever? His head is beginning to ache again, so he leans his head back and closes his eyes... listening to the bubbling of his fish tank is calming and he allows his present thoughts to drift into his memories.

Mulder knows on an instinctual level Diana isn't being completely truthful with him, yet it's so hard - he thought they meant something to each other - once. Not deep and abiding love not on his part. At some point it seemed it became something more on hers, he was unaware of when that happened exactly. It was he thought it was a relationship built on shared interests...it was safe - familiar in a way and he thought they both agreed with the no strings attached nature. It wasn't anything like his relationship with Phoebe, mentally cruel and filled with riskier sexual escapades as time went on - his body enjoyed it, yet he knew it would eventually self destruct. 

The parting with Diana was mostly amicable, Mulder thought he knew the reason she ultimately accepted the position overseas. Not only was it a career advancement, but after several hints each one less subtle than the last she finally asked him if there was a future for them beyond their professional working relationship and the occasional fuck which as he immersed himself in the X-File cases had become fewer and farther in between. He took too long to respond, and she finally told him she was taking the assignment. She also told him that he was a child and until he grew up, quit looking for his sister and created his own family - a wife - children - a true home she could no longer be a part of his world. She told him her flight number and the time it was leaving for Europe, she kissed him lightly on the cheek and walked out of his apartment. 

********

Mulder and Diana kept in contact sporadically for a couple of years email conversations were more like those of distance relatives or acquaintances than one time friends and lovers until they stopped altogether. He couldn't remember who sent the last one. 

There's no way he could know that she sat watching both the clock in the airport and her watch waiting for him to show up and stop her, confess that he wanted the life she spoke of with him. The announcement for her plane to board was made she had 2nd and 3rd thoughts before she took her seat, she wasn't alone in the row long before he sat beside her his hair and clothing permeated with the scent of stale smoke.

"You were right. He didn't come."

'For me' was not verbalized and it hung in the air, a weighted thought. His response was so condescending she wanted to punch him - she knew that wasn't wise.

"Of course I was."

********

Diana isn't the only reason he's concerned about Scully and his place in her life now. They'd finally consummated the long simmering sexual tension between them and words truly couldn't describe it, but the happiness he felt initially didn't last and now he wonders when is the other shoe going to drop. Will it finally be the end, the end of any relationship - with the reveal of a secret he'd been keeping from her? He can't believe how he just blurted it out in the FBI elevator of all places, but when she confided in him. He was hopeful that some of the recent and past hurtful words were being laid to rest. He wanted to get their relationship back with all it's twists and turns - more every day - he wanted to be happy again.

*************

Day Unknown  
Memories

Mulder turns when he hears the ding the elevator doors open and he looks at her in relieved surprise. He is wearing a suit she mentioned once as fitting him well and asked was it new which he said it was and his FBI badge.

"There you are. I've been looking all over for you." 

He remembers getting into the elevator with her and quickly giving her the once over which he hopes she doesn't notice and she doesn't. She seems miles away. She is dressed in a charcoal gray skirt suit with an ivory shell and her hair is longer, softer than it is now. He remembers noticing she wasn't wearing her cross it seems such a part of her that he recalls it's been missing off and on in the last few months. He wonders if it's getting cleaned or repaired. The elevator doors close before she begins to speak.

"Hi. Um, I'm sorry. I had a doctor's appointment and, um, I don't know, I guess time just got away from me." She is having trouble meeting his eyes. He remembers feeling concerned, the specter of cancer always hovering somewhere in the back of his subconscious he tried not to press too hard, but he had to ask. "Is anything the matter?"

"Nothing. No, I just, uh... I went for a walk." She still isn't meeting his eyes.

"Mmm. Then what's wrong?" Scully sighs. "I'm... I'm sorry we -I haven't - I mean, you were always there for me during my illness and when I found Emily but, um...

His heart picks up rhythm, he closes his eyes trying to keep calm before he leans into her and speaks softly with a small smile. "Don't make me guess."

She finally looks at him. "You already know I was left unable to conceive with whatever test that they did on me. And I am not ready to accept that I will never have children."

He had looked down as the elevator dinged and the doors opened into the basement. He walked out, then turned back to the elevator. "Scully, there's, um, there's something I haven't told you either and I hope you, uh, forgive me and understand why I would have kept it from you."

"What?"

He'd imagined this conversation taking place in so many different ways, different places, but not this... "During my investigation into your illness I know I told you about the harvesting of genetic material from ova that were taken from you and stored in a government lab."

"What?" She gasps looking at him in shock. The elevator doors begin to close, but she puts up her hand to stop them. "You found them?"

He didn't want to tell her not now not here....yet he knew there was no turning back. "I-I took them directly to a specialist who would tell me if they were okay."

"I don't believe this." So many emotions are in that one statement...even hope which he wished he could give her, but had been told it was impossible. He had to make her understand. "Scully, you were deathly ill, and I... I couldn't bear to give you another piece of bad news."

She's looking at him, hurt, but that slight bit of light, hope remains. "Is that what it was? It was bad news?" He doesn't want to say it. He didn't want to extinguish that tiny spark he could see in her eyes. Reluctantly he spoke. "The doctor said that the ova weren't viable."

Her eyes are focused drilling right into his for a moment before she speaks bluntly. "I want a second opinion." She presses the button and the doors start to close. He reached out with both hands and kept them from closing. They looked at each other. Scully gives a short nod, "Well?" the undercurrent of 'let me go' plain. Reluctantly Mulder lets the doors close and she disappeared from his sight was it good this time? 

Perfect time he thought, there never could be or have been a perfect time to reveal all to her. He'd rehearsed it at different times in his head, tried to form a plan, had even tried to tell her once or twice...but the words just wouldn't come. He'd talk himself out of it every time - It's too soon, it's not the right time, I'll do it I will, just not today. He should have told her, she had a right to know she's his friend, his partner, but he acknowledges she's so much more - but oh he didn't want to be the one to reveal this truth. Will he have the chance to let her know? He should have found the courage to tell her no matter the consequences.

He wandered back into the basement office before sweeping everything from his desk in a violent motion before dropping into his chair a headache starting to pound through his head the sudden onset surprising him. He laid his cheek down on the cool desk, the steady thump thump rippling through his brain and was unconscious in moments.

The next thing he knows is the feel of her small cool hands running over his face, feeling his forehead, brushing his cheek, her fingertips on his neck taking his pulse, brushing through his hair. Her voice it's, muffled like when you're under water, not desperate sounding exactly but worried. "Mulder... Mulder... wake up... Muld- ... please."

His eyelids feel like they are weighted and when he opens them the light is so bright he groans at the stabbing pain in his head, he quickly shuts them again. He hears Scully move away from him it seems longer than the few seconds he knows it to be, until her hands are on him again flitting here and there yet with purpose. "Mulder? Try opening your eyes again I dimmed the light." Her voice is calmer now, yet commanding. He tries again and blinks a few times focusing on her face, his tries for a small smile, "Hey..."

She sighs in relief, returning his smile as she cups his jaw and cheek with her left hand her thumb lazily rubbing back and forth. "Hey yourself..." There's a peaceful moment and then she stiffens slightly and starts to move away, but Mulder grasps her hand before she can gain any momentum and nuzzles his cheek and lips against her palm. "Scully..." He murmurs. Before she knows it her other hand is back on his head fingertips again tracing soothing random patterns through his hairline she come upon the raised area from his most recent bullet wound. She knows it almost killed him and he was to get regular checkups with a neurologist every 4-6 weeks. "Mulder have you been to see your Neurology Dr. on schedule?"

Somehow their positions have changed Mulder is now nuzzling her abdomen his arms around her waist and hips in a loose embrace her left hand still cups his jaw and cheek. Which she uses to turn his head up so she can look at him, she knows he's stalling - she knows the answer already... "Mulder?" He shrugs his look turning sheepish. "Well I went to ... a couple."

She disengages and pulls away from him completely pacing the office stepping on the papers he had earlier deposited unceremoniously on the floor. Mulder is now sitting up straight and watching her warily. Finally she stops. He can see her muttering to herself before she opens her desk drawer, grabs the bottle of Tylenol she keeps in there, shakes a couple into her hand and after getting him a cup of water she hands them unceremoniously to him. He takes them without complaint.

"Mulder... you have to go to your appointments. You had a traumatic brain injury when you were shot, I'm still not sure how you managed to get out of the hospital let alone to Antarctica ..." She touches his face gently she hopes he'll listen to her. "I know I wouldn't be here if not for you.... but Mulder please complications can occur years after trauma like you endured. You just had a concussion when we found you in the water after you searched for the Queen Anne. Mulder you've had many head injuries over the years and the science is still inconclusive , but the studies don't look good on what the cumulative effects of multiple injuries can be. Please, please make and appointment and keep it."

"Okay." He whispers. She nods and leaves the office. Mulder sighs and picks up the phone. "Hello, yes this is Fox Mulder I need to make an appointment and I've been seeing...."


End file.
